The present invention relates generally to systems and methods for inputting, recording, disseminating, displaying and documenting timing, scoring and statistical information related to a sports game in real time. More specifically, the present invention relates to systems and methods that allow a single referee to simultaneously officiate a game, communicate game information and document game statistics and results; whereas, these tasks are typically performed by a plurality of people.
The present invention relates to a sports game scorekeeping system that utilizes a wireless mobile computational system, a wireless scoreboard, at least one remote computational system and the internet to record, disseminate, store and display game information. In many sports games such as soccer/football, lacrosse, basketball, etc., a number of different officials are ideally required, such as a referee, several assistant referees, a timekeeper, a scorekeeper, a scoreboard operator, an announcer, etc. The present invention allows many of the activities performed by these officials to be completed in real time by a single referee while on the field of play. This is important since in many amateur, youth or club sport events, it may not be practical to hire a plurality of officials to perform the various tasks for all games. In this document, “field” is defined as any playing area for a sports game such as a basketball court, football gridiron, baseball diamond, corral, lacrosse field, race course, running track, cricket pitch, hockey rink, bicycle velodrome, swimming pool, etc.
Monitoring and accurately recording game data such as game timing, time outs, number of time outs, penalty times, penalty types, infringing players, scores, scoring players, stoppage times, overtime, ejections, scoreboard postings, field positions, social media postings, etc. (all or part of this list defined as a “plurality of game statistics” or “game data”) is overwhelming for a single individual if he/she is using traditional disparate systems; thus, officiating any game is best performed by a plurality of officials. On the other hand, the referee on the field is typically aware of nearly all of the significant events that occur during a game. Thus, since most of these tasks fall within a finite set, if the referee is supplied with sufficiently easy-to-use tools, he/she should be able to communicate with the various devices and constituents through an appropriately integrated user interface system to perform many if not all of them. The aim of the current invention is to provide such a scorekeeping system and associated methods.
Previous systems have been reported to record data during games and make that data available to others after being stored in a database. For example, Sullivan, U.S. Pat. Nos. 8,731,458 and 9,393,485, describe data being recorded in a baseball game and displayed on remote devices for fans that are not present at the game. These data include graphical locations of plays on the field. Such a system would not be practical for use in a game with only a single official, given the complexity of data input. In addition, fans at the game would not be able to conveniently view game statistics unless the facility had an independent scoreboard operated by a dedicated official. Likewise, U.S. Pat. Nos. 9,454,993, 9,330,726, 6,148,242, 6,725,107, 6,984,176, 9,330,726, US 20020049507, US 20020091723, www.sportsengine.com, and www.siplay.com describe systems and methods for recording game statistics that require significant attention, not appropriate for a single, on-field official.
Wrist or arm-mounted wireless keypads have been used to directly control scoreboards from the field or sidelines (for example Funtronix Score N Time, Cave Creek, Ariz.). Although these systems are able to start and stop the game-clock, change game score and toggle other on/off indicators on a traditional scoreboard, they are unable to record more detailed game data, nor are they able to send a large plurality of game statistics to a scoreboard or any statistics to devices other than the scoreboard.
The present invention overcomes the limitations of previous systems and allows a single game official or referee to perform nearly all of the functions required to properly officiate, communicate and document the important statistics in a game. Such communication may include sharing game information with fans who are present at the event through scoreboards or similar displays and sharing game information with fans who are not present at the event, but who are monitoring through remote computational systems. By remote computational systems we mean any computer, laptop, tablet, smartphone or other device that can receive data through the internet. Such remote computational systems may be located at or near the field or any remote location.